Suede “Bloodsports” deluxe box set fails to deliver promised content

Suede fans are taking to the band’s own forum to complain about the £100 deluxe box set bundle of Bloodsports.

The expensive – now sold-out – set consists of the new album on CD and vinyl; a hardback book; a seven-inch single; a T-shirt; a signed lithograph and a USB stick.

The problem is that the USB stick – unique to this bundle – was advertised as containing “exclusive video content”, and was also supposed to contain the two bonus tracks from the seven-inch single in addition to the standard album in digital form. Fans who have already received their boxes report that it fact doesn’t contain any video at all (just a couple of folders of random images) and the audio – in WAV and MP3 format – is just the basic 10 album tracks with no sign of Dawn Chorus and No Holding Back, the bonus tracks in question.

I tried to ask questions about this box set for a month before it came out, it took their customer service department a week each time to respond.
To order it to the U.S. with their huge shipping charge it would have been $240 US Dollars!
I actually tried to buy it, but the site kept giving me error messages.
That is when I gave up on it, I guess it is a good thing I did.
This is how bands lose fans.
I tried to complain to their official website about Warner’s mis-management of this special release and received a “warning”.
It sucks when a band doesn’t care that their fans, who ALLOW them to have a musical career, are getting screwed over!

Didz is a studio and touring Bassist. I once whined on their forum of how I missed out on those signed-by-the-band Deluxe Re-issues simply because I was American. I pointed out that it was especially disappointing because I missed out on a signed “DOG MAN STAR”…

He sent me a private message, explained he was their site manager, and asked for my home address.

He sent me a Japanese promo copy of the Deluxe “Dog Man Star”. The great thing was, my digipak case had been crushed in the mail from Townsend Records. So getting one that was MINT was fantastic. The DVD didn’t work as it was region -2, but I swapped that DVD for the Region-free/format-free one and sold the Region 2 set on eBay. This Deluxe DOG MAN STAR showed up with a note that read “Steven, here’s a complimentary copy of Dog Man Star signed by the three contributing members of Suede. Please understand that it would be much, much easier to get Ed Buller to sign this than Bernard Butler, and Ed Buller has no hands” (which I found funny). He continued “Ed Buller does indeed have hands, but I hope you get my point.”

Actually a fantastic guy and I’ve never ever griped since! But, I met Bernard Butler during his North American tour at a small in-store and I can see how Bernard wouldn’t be really approachable. I walked up with a Suede Debut Vinyl LP (a real rarity in the states) and, knowing how he was regarding Suede at the time, I reluctantly asked “Are you comfortable signing this?” – – he replied “Why wouldn’t I be?! I fu***ng wrote it!” – But, you know? That’s how I want my rockstars. He’s a guitar genius and gave me two of my top 10 ever albums… And I prefer the “bigger than life” persona – – – Don’t want him to be a big sweetie.

I did notice, but didn’t know he was their manager… As I said on twitter when you charge £100 for a 12-track box set, be careful with the word “Disproportionate”. How do you know he is their manager, out of interest? P

I bought the standard vinyl version and it is for want of a better word, a shambles. The vinyl itself although sealed was heavily marked. It popped and clicked and the recording level is low. I had to turn the volume up on the amp.

What probably doesn’t help is the inner sleeve being quite coarse card. maybe this is marking them but the shop where i bought mine from opened all their sealed copies and they were all the same.

It’s clear that this pressing has been made cheaply using recycled vinyl. Warner Bros. clearly are on a maximum mark exercise with this release and have mugged us punters right off. It’s a shame cause it is a very good album.

I only bought the standard U.S. edition, and found the cardboard sleeve to be poorly manufactured. I also thought that Suede was going by Suede in the States now, since Amazon changed the item description from London Suede back to Suede for the Bloodsports release, but not so–except for on the CD label itself. The design aside from the cover is awful. Not on par with previous releases. Did anyone buy the limited digipak U.K. edition? Was more care put into that?

Mine was packaged ok, but side B of the vinyl is pressed off-centre pretty badly, so it sounds terrible. Not the way to present a deluxe edition – but reminds me of the mess Warners made of the New Order reissues…

Yes, mine also had a big split down one side of where the record is being housed, and i’ve also just noticed a nice big scratch all the way across side 2 of the LP, there’s so much wrong with this i’m almost beginning to think this is an early April Fools joke now.

Denis! Same happened to me. My mail to warner customerservice got bounced back too …So if anybody here really got these 3 wav bonus tracks, please mail them to me. I’d really appreciate it very very much! frank@weberfrank.de ….otherwise I will have to wait until they’ll come out again on some other format…

And one more thing, the labels on the 7″ are on the wrong sides of the record.

They say were been a bit picky about this set. I honestly think they need to go back to the drawing board, put everything right that’s wrong with this set properly and re-send to everyone who’s already ordered one, or give a complete 100% refunds in compensation for releasing a sub standard set, how embarrasing.

They broke the law by saying they would give you something and then did not. If you don’t get a partial refund you can probably file some sort of complaint with whatever the British version of the FTC is.